


Three Evils.

by Puimoo



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-18
Updated: 2012-03-18
Packaged: 2017-11-02 03:12:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/364348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Puimoo/pseuds/Puimoo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They all have their own demons.  Natsume, Kitamoto, and Nishimura centric.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Evils.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snarkydame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snarkydame/gifts).



> Just a little treat!

**See**

“He just tripped!” Nishimura says with bright eyes and a wide smile, patting Natsume on the back as he stumbles to his feet. Kitamoto also smiles and his eyes also shine, but there is a sharpness there that dares anyone to contradict his best friend, or to point out there is nothing in front of Natsume to make him trip so.

The crowds fall away, convinced more by eyes and smiles than any sort of fact, but their ridicule is perhaps … it is perhaps more preferable to the guilt that sinks to his stomach. There is relief in Nishimura's gaze (but who for?), and Kitamoto's sharpness doesn't fade so much as it takes on a thoughtful edge.

What is it they see, Natsume wonders, while Natsume sees the youkai? Do they see a damaged young boy who trips up on the demons in his head, or do they see a fool who can only find attention through such pathetic means?

Perhaps they see dishonesty and lies. Kitamoto certainly recognises his faltering smiles for what they are, and Nishimura is too quick now in Natsume's defence to surely believe everything that he says. 

“We'll walk you home,” Kitamoto says warmly, and Nishimura grasps onto Natsume's arm with a grin. 

Natsume sees their honesty and their trust, and yet-

Natsume has always had difficulty telling the difference between reality and his own, misplaced hopes.

  
**Hear**   


Nishimura fills the silence because he hears their voices even in the void. An accompanying piece that filters through whatever he is doing, it as though they are all playing out an imaginary beat inside his skull. Nishimura, the annoyance. Nishimura, the tarnished, brass son who cannot compare to the bright gleam of the golden child. Nishimura, who is never proper enough or clever enough or talented enough to spin his own place in this tiny, claustrophobic town. It's a town which only has room for a special kind of person, and one that Nishimura can never touch.

Nishimura knows that he is silly and flighty and superficial; he hears those words on both warm, exasperated voices and in the cold annoyance of his parent's occasional moments of interest. He thinks sometimes he might be something more if he just had the chance, if there were words that existed somewhere else beyond this hole in the ground that he feels he's buried in. It's not that he isn't those things, enjoys who he is when caught in a moment of fancy or chasing after some brief, warm uplift of wind. 

But for a chance ...

“Nishimura, I need you to listen to me.”

Nishimura blinks, startled. “But you didn't say anything!” How unfair, for Kitamoto to level such an accusation against him when Nishimura has done nothing wrong! Kitamoto is smiling expectantly, waiting for Nishimura to catch on. Even Natsume seems to waiting for something, a tiny smile flirting at the corner of his mouth. They're sharing a secret about Nishimura and they're extending an invitation, and it shouts of a special sort of insight that Nishimura finds so difficult to fully realise on his own.

… he grasps it.

“Satoru, hurry up and get into the car! We're going to be late picking up your brother.” 

Only to hear it slip like rice through his fingers.

  


**Speak**  


Kitamoto speaks little of things of personal importance, keeping his father hidden behind a private veil and his difficulty in maths smothered away in late night study sessions that break the handles off mugs and shatter the ugly vase on his windowsill. He saves his words instead for others, offering pointed insight that is meant to assist without shrouding things away in politeness or warmth. He warns Natsume of Nishimura's clingy nature and grounds Nishimura when he tries to escape too much into a world of clouds.

Kitamoto always speaks his mind, it is his heart that he finds easier to keep muted.

At least, he's always thought so.

“We're going out,” Nishimura says with childish determination, his mouth fixed in a firm, short line that is so unlike his friend's arsenal of ready smiles.

“Natori-san has invited us on-set,” Natsume adds, almost apologetic. And yet, Natsume holds onto a determination of his own, as subtle and wary as it is. “We thought it would be nice if we all went along.”

“We've already cleared it with your mum,” Nishimura pronounces victoriously, and Kitamoto wonders when Nishimura had the opportunity to do so – or better yet, how long this has been planned.

Kitamoto has spent the last three weeks sitting at his father's side, watching a sleeping, greying man tossing in his sleep between unconsciousness and something more eternal. It is always these winter months that are the worst, slowly teasing away the threads of his father's life, before allowing spring to weave them back in again. He hasn't spoken to anyone of it, not even his mother who simply shares his silence with a kind gentleness that somehow gets them through. 

Sometimes, maybe, he speaks to his friends in ways that don't require words.

They go together to the movie set, and they show up the background of one of Natori-san's scenes for a full three seconds.

His father dies the next summer. His friends read about it in the obituaries column.


End file.
